England make early move to keep Everton and Newcastle midfielders away from Super Eagles

The English Football Association has made the first move to provisionally cap-tie two promising midfielders of Nigerian descent, allnigeriasoccer.com reports.

Everton's Malik Olayiwola and Newcastle United's Sam Alabi have both received call-ups to the England U17 squad for the UEFA European U17 Championship Qualifying Round taking place in Glasgow.

Although the pair have already featured for England at U17 level, with Alabi even captaining the team in two friendly matches last month, their inclusion for the qualifiers carries greater significance.

Should Olayiwola and Alabi feature in any of the upcoming fixtures, they will become provisionally cap-tied to England.

This would mean that, to represent Nigeria's Super Eagles in the future, they would have to formally request a change of association.

England U17s are set to face Scotland on 28 October at Excelsior Stadium, followed by Lithuania on 31 October and Sweden on 3 November as they begin their quest to qualify for next summer's finals in Estonia.

Before earning promotion to the U17 squad this season, Olayiwola made ten appearances for England U16s, while Alabi featured eleven times, registering two assists.

At club level, 16-year-old Alabi has played above his age group this season, making appearances for Newcastle U19s and U21s in the UEFA Youth League and EFL Trophy respectively.

Super Eagles stars Alex Iwobi, Ola Aina and Ademola Lookman previously represented England at youth level before committing their international futures to Nigeria.

Ifeanyi Emmanuel

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